Summary
TheFast and Furiousfranchise is one of the longest-running and frequently updated franchises in the modern movie landscape. The Fast franchise has reached new heights with each installment. What started as a simple, concise story about a street-racing crime family has evolved into high-spectacle, action blockbuster movies, where the original cast of characters are all somehow masters ofshooting, hand-to-hand combat, and car-fu. Despite leaning into absurd territories, the fans who still watch the Fast franchise have learned to love and accept whatever is thrown their way in exchange for a fun ‘turn your brain off’ action movie.
One of the most absurd tropes, however, in recent releases, is the trend of characters who have been previously killed off, returning with very little explanation to how they survived. Some fans feel that this trend is actually harmful because when characters in theFast and Furiousfranchise “die”, fans know to read this in heavy quotation marks. They know, more likely than not, this won’t be the last they see of the character in question, which will inevitably take away a lot of the emotional impact of future characters' deaths in the franchise. Yet there is also the argument that this is a good thing because it keeps longtime fans engaged in anticipation of seeing their favorite characters make a return.
This Trend Worked Effectively In The Beginning
The first character that received this treatment was Letty Ortiz. Letty was revealed to have been murdered inFast and Furious(the fourth film installment) and she doesn’t return untilFast & Furious 6. This worked a lot better in the beginning, mostly because Letty’s arc felt unresolved. The audience learns about her death the same way Dom does, through a phone call, where it’s simply stated she’s been murdered. Letty was a key character in the first film and clearly very important to Dom as not only a love interest but also her support of his crew or family, as he would call it. So for her to have an off-screen deathfelt a little unjust to the character.
The decision to bring Letty back not only made sense for her character arc, but it was also justified, because while Letty did survive her presumed death, she did not do so without consequences. After crawling out of a car wreck, her attacker shoots the gas tank of her crashed car, causing an explosion and blasting Letty’s body away. In retrospect, with how theaudience now understands the Fast franchise, this is comparatively a minor injury to what other characters have easily survived and brushed off. But when Letty makes her reappearance inFast & Furious 6, she has lost her memory as a result of her injuries.
This is effective because it shows that the franchise isn’t just trying to rush her back into the series for cheap fan service, but her reintroduction actually serves a narrative purpose. InFast & Furious 6, Letty is working for Luke Hobbs, the villain. She doesn’t remember Dom and even shoots him at one point. This creates a major conflict the movie needs to resolve, and it’s not until the very end ofFurious 7when Letty finally gets her full memory back after falling in love with Dom all over again. The process of killing Letty off, bringing her back, and her getting a resolution by regaining her memories spans across four movies. But this dedication was only given to Letty.
Characters Don’t Need Much Of A Reason To Return
From this point, the “deaths” only get more and more absurd. Han being the case, most fans point to regarding hownobody seems to stay deadin the Fast franchise. InTokyo Drift(the third installment), Han gets into a car crash, where the character is shown upside down, face pressed against the pavement just seconds before his car explodes into flames. Amateurs of the Fast franchise may assume this killed him, but it was, of course, an elaborate plan by Mr Nobody to fake Han’s death so he could go into hiding to protect Project Aries, a dangerous device that had no mention up untilF9, and required the DNA of a young woman named Elle to access it, because of course that’s what actually happened.
Han’s love interestGisele also received the same treatment. It is revealed she survived at the very end ofFast Xand the credits roll before any explanation can be given. However, no matter what the next installment can come up with in the way of explanation, Gisele’s survival is still the most perplexing. InFast & Furious 6, Gisele heroically jumps to her death to protect Han, falling backwards off a car traveling at the speed of a departing jet onto a concrete runway. When Gisele makes her reappearance, she also doesn’t have any visible injuries or scars and seems completely free of injury despite her fall.
Despite all of its absurdity and suspension of reality, theFast and Furiousfranchise manages to get away with what most movies can not and this is clearly something it’s aware of, and is using very advantageously. Despite their purpose being to entertain, most modern movies have to be somewhat grounded in reality, because audiences have become very critical of what they consider plot holes or unrealistic events.Fast and Furioushas somehow declared itself as the exception to this rule, and it’s almost certain that the franchise will go to even further heights in its next installment, and there will surely be a loyal and devoted audience happy to see this unfold on the big screen.
